LATEST ADDITIONS

It only makes sense. <A HREF="http://www.pbs.org">PBS</A&gt;, the most visible national broadcaster of classical-music-related programs, has decided to launch its own classical-music label. According to a recent story in <I>Variety</I>, several major record labels are competing for the rights to distribute the new label. It's common in the music business for larger labels to distribute smaller ones, and an association with the new PBS label is seen as a feather in the cap of whoever makes the deal.

As of October, Meridian America's new VP/Sales, replacing the late Ross Keim, was industry veteran Andy Regan, who started his high-end career at Manhattan retailer Sound by Singer. Most recently, Regan was VP/Sales at cable manufacturer AudioQuest. Not uncoincidentally, Joe Abrams has moved from cable manufacturer MIT to AudioQuest.

How much power do you really need? What does it do for you, anyway? Even before the single-ended renaissance, the prevailing wisdom was that you really didn't need that much power. When I had a pair of Met 7 speakers, even the "1 watt" indicator LED was hardly ever lit. Ditto for my time with a Threshold Stasis Two&mdash;all those cool power-indicator LEDs just sat there dark. Besides, everyone knows that power can be had only at tremendous cost, both monetary and in terms of other performance attributes.

Digital audio took another lurch forward at Comdex '97 with the display of Yamaha's FireWire-to-PCM converter technology.

It won't be long before the Net-connected music lover will be able to sample and hold the tunes of his choice without having to visit Tower Records. High-speed transmission, high-density storage, and CD-quality music online---the three parts of the downloading puzzle---all fell into place the week of November 10.

When I first attended Comdex several years back, it was easy to feel like a fish out of water. My core interests were always high-end audio---and the computer biz at the time would get excited about anything that sounded as good as a telephone. But I was still curious about what all the brainiacs were up to.

DVD audio standards are still up in the air, but promise (hopefully) to come down soon. For our inaugural question, we want to know what you prefer: fewer channels and longer playing times, or multichannel high-quality sound with shorter playing times.